


The Gang Graduated High School

by Prix



Series: It's Always Sunny in Domino City [1]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series, Yu-Gi-Oh! - All Media Types, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack Treated Seriously, Gen, Slice of Life, intended as the beginning of a thing, millennial angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-30
Updated: 2018-10-30
Packaged: 2019-08-10 00:08:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16459685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prix/pseuds/Prix
Summary: The Gang graduated high school, and it turns out important card games don't turn up for every major life change after all.





	The Gang Graduated High School

 

_ Kame Game Shop, Domino City, somewhere in Japan (probably)  _

  
  


The thing about life is that you generally have to plan for it. For most of the local teenagers, this meant that the past few years had been filled with studying, sleepless nights, and desperately preparing for the strange respite that entrance into college would turn out to be. For Yugi Mutou and his friends, on the other hand, those years had been filled with competitive, sometimes deadly card games, other occasionally lethal plots by the wealthy, living and dead, and millennia's worth of destiny fulfillment and defiance. 

In short, Yugi hadn't really put much effort into his final exams. It wasn't that he was stupid or completely incapable. It was just that he had a lot on his mind and still had a lot to deal with. The Internet reassured him that this decision wasn't necessarily slow-motion suicide. He could always go to college in the States. Someday. Maybe. 

In the meantime, when March rolls around, Yugi finds himself with a lot of time on his hands. 

He hasn't received any mysterious, antiquated forms of media storage in the mail lately. 

He hasn't been invited or blackmailed into any absurdly high-takes competitions lately. 

Mostly, for the first week or so, he hardly leaves his room. 

One morning, long after he would have – in the recent past – been up and headed to school, he is lying in bed and staring at the ceiling. He takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and feels the familiar, rather heavy weight resting at the center of his chest. He had fallen asleep without taking it off his neck again. He doesn't even remember when that got easier anymore. It feels like it has always been there, rendering sleeping on his stomach a non-option. 

He closes his eyes, and his mind is somewhere else and yet hasn't moved a bit. 

“ _Pharaoh, do you think I made a mistake?”_ he asks, for what good it will do. 

“ _What do you mean?”_ comes the response. It is prompt, and yet the fact that the Pharaoh seems pretty oblivious to what it might be makes Yugi feel a bit of uncomfortable warmth on his face. He isn't sure if it is embarrassment or frustration. For all the time they have spent together, their life experiences and frames of reference continue to be strangely alien from each other. For some reason, it hurts his feelings a little. 

“ _About not going to college here. Or now. Or maybe at all.”_

“ _I'm not sure what you're worried about,”_ the Pharaoh dismisses without any hesitation. _“I never went to school, and you didn't seem to enjoy it very much.”_

Yugi reflects on it without responding for a moment, almost as if he has his mind and his thoughts to himself. He hadn't necessarily applied himself the way he could have in school. He had spent a lot of time wishing he could be perfecting other skills instead, making up ways to turn whatever he did manage to study or learn into a game. And yet, without it, he doesn't know what to do with himself. He feels like he could lie in bed all day without any reason at all to move. He doesn't even have to do it for company, and it isn't like his friends are reliably in any one particular place anymore. 

“ _You were a wealthy ruler three thousand years ago,”_ Yugi finally retorts, maybe a little testily. Somehow, this gives him the motivation to push himself up into a seated position in bed. He has only just opened his eyes again when he nearly jumps out of his skin as there is a surprisingly strong, singular knock at his bedroom door, followed by a familiar voice that doesn't ring just inside his mind. 

“Yugi!” his grandfather calls. “Are you alright in there?” 

“Ye-Yes,” Yugi stammers a little, rubbing the back of his head and smoothing up his bedhead with his hand. “I'll... be up in a minute,” he says. 

“I'd like to see you downstairs in the shop, when you get a minute,” his grandfather says, pretty kindly but Yugi can sense the disappointment even in his grandpa's voice. “And make yourself presentable!” comes the retreating, jovial, scathing follow-up as he hears his grandfather walk away, back towards the stairs and the front of the shop. 

\- - - 

“I guess that's a good idea,” Yugi says. He is looking down at the familiar pattern on the back of one of his Duel Monsters cards. His fingertip rubs against the curved edge of his deck. He is fidgeting with them, for comfort more than anything else. He means what he says. It is a good idea. He just doesn't like the topic of conversation. It is another reminder that everything has changed over the course a month and that it likely won't stop anytime soon. He would much rather be dangling from a precipice somewhere or navigating an unknown spiritual plane than feeling like he is doing those things just by standing here at home. 

“Isn't that what you always wanted, Yugi?” his grandfather tuts softly. “You love games! You know nearly as much about them as I do,” Grandpa adds with a wink. “And in time you'll know everything. You'll keep this little shop alive. I won't be around forever, you know.” 

He says it like it doesn't matter that he's talking about his impending death. Maybe he can do it because his death isn't  _ immediately _ impending, as far as anyone knows, but Yugi fought to get his grandfather's soul back more than once. All this conversation manages to be is a temple-pounding reminder that one day there will be a place that he cannot win his grandfather's soul back from. 

“ _... You don't **know** that,” _ the Pharaoh offers, ineffectually, inside his head. He ignores him. 

\- - - 

Jounouchi smells like some mixture of sweat and body spray when he comes into the game shop several hours later. Yugi is minding the counter alone – a volunteer position for the moment, but he figures he is earning his keep. After that conversation about mortality and the passage of time, he hadn't minded the idea of only having to deal with the constant presence of one ancient soul and giving his grandfather a break had seemed like a nice thing to do. 

Yugi looks up at his friend with a sidelong sort of appraisal. It isn't that Joey  _ stinks _ , exactly, but it seems like he has decided to forgo a shower for the day. His hair is a little less light than usual, weighed down by its own oil. Yugi wrinkles his nose. He doesn't mean to, but it is yet another cause for concern. 

“Uh, how's looking for a job going?” Yugi remembers to ask after a second. He should at least be grateful that he is going to have a roof over his head whether or not he is in school, whether or not he has a job outside Grandpa's business. 

“I got one!” Jounouchi announces enthusiastically. It is like he has won the world for a second. Then he follows it up with: “... It's just a temporary gig, though. Unloading boxes from these big trucks for one of them construction companies.” 

“That's great,” Yugi replies. That would explain some of the unusually strong scent of Jounouchi. He means it. The creeping existential dread is his own problem. 

“What about you?” Jounouchi asks. “... Anything going on with the, uh...” he says, leaning against one arm on the counter and using his back to block the view of the door. He points conspicuously at the Millennium Puzzle hanging from Yugi's neck where, thankfully, no one can see. 

“I don't think the Pharaoh is going to give me a job,” Yugi whispers softly, in spite of the two of them being the only ones in the shop at the moment. His mouth twists into a crooked configuration. He straightens his back a little, like he is trying to ascend to some greater height. He hears one of his vertebrae click loudly into compliance. “Don't really think it's his style,” he jokes a bit pointedly. 

“ _I do not participate in the modern economy of yours_.” 

“No, of course not,” Yugi finds himself saying aloud. “You're a freeloader.” 

Jonounchi raises his eyebrows. 

“Trouble in paradise there, Yug'?” he asks. 

Yugi shakes his head quickly as if to rattle himself out of it. 

“No. Sorry. Not you. I mean—”

He is almost as relieved as Jounouchi is startled off the counter when the bell at the door rings and someone else enters the shop. The carefully gelled hair is the first thing that announces Honda's presence. 

“I have arrived!” is the second thing that announces his presence. 

He is followed shortly by Anzu who is carrying a brown, supple leather satchel clutched tightly in her fingers. It is the sort of thing meant to carry school papers and books, and just from that little glimpse, she looks the same as ever. It probably means something that this is the first thing Yugi notices about her today. 

Both Honda and Anzu are dressed in much sharper angles than Jounouchi and Yugi. Honda wears a blue blazer, unbuttoned, over a white t-shirt that looks like it might have been ironed that does not have even the trace of an old stain in sight. Anzu wears a pleated skirt, just shorter than their high school uniforms had allowed but still past her fingertips, and a soft, airy pink sweater that matches a loose, knit hat on top of her head. She looks different. They both do. Just a little. 

Yugi wonders if it's ironic that Honda is the one who decided to disappear into sleepless nights and desperate reading until he was the one who bothered with taking his final exams seriously. Of course, with Anzu, there hadn't really been a question. While Yugi knows she wants to be a dancer and to run off to Broadway or something some day, he also knows that she is probably – if only by merit of being a girl – the least reckless and stupid among them. 

“Hey guys!” Jounouchi greets them. “I got a job!” he announces. He explains again that it is just a temporary thing and yet he refuses to stop beaming with pride at himself. Whatever it is that is eating away at Yugi's half of his own mind, it apparently doesn't enter into his. 

\- - - 

“Are you okay, Yugi?” Anzu asks him half an hour later when they have gone back into the living area behind the front of the shop. She has taken her place on the couch beside him, and he is glad that he decided to take a shower before going down to talk to his grandfather. 

“Yeah, why?” Yugi asks, maybe too quickly and too softly, trying to let his answer not disrupt the fragile familiarity that comes with the four of them huddled around the television. He looks at her eyes, hoping she doesn't see through... something or another. 

“I don't know. It just seems like you're afraid of something,” she remarks. 

Jounouchi perks up into the conversation at that point. It is almost like his hair even looks a little less greasy as he takes an interest. 

“... What're you sayin', Anzu?” he asks. 

“I was just asking Yugi if he was alright,” she replies. 

From his other side, Yugi feels the sharp jab of Jounouchi's elbow into his ribs. A new worry occurs to him: if Jounouchi keeps a loading dock job for long, those jabs might become yet another threat to his life. They're strong enough already. 

“Yugi's alright. Right, man?” he asks. He is still clinging to his good mood without wavering at all. 

“Yeah, fine.” 

“Wait a minute,” Honda says. “You're not hiding something from us... are you?” he demands with a narrowing of his eyes and an intense concentration that makes Yugi want to squirm. He hadn't known that Honda count concentrate quite that hard until the past couple of months. 

“I'm fine, guys,” he promises. “Everything is just fine,” he says, lifting his hands in an appeasing gesture. 

“Yeah, but you'd... tell us if there was something going on, right?” Jounouchi asks, tenderly invested in the question in a way that shows how important it is to him. 

Yugi smiles, soft in response to it. 

“Of course, I would, it's just...” 

“You can tell us, Yugi,” Anzu insists. 

“That's the thing,” he replies quickly when the answer occurs to him. “There's nothing to tell. No... new tournament or gambit for your souls or discoveries of ancient clues into my destiny or _this_ ,” he says, jangling the weight of the Millennium Puzzle by its chain around his neck a little, “... down at the local museum. Nothing.” 

Jounouchi is the one that seems the most cooled by the very slight outburst, as if Yugi has put a wet blanket over his pride in himself. He feels a little twinge of guilt for it. 

“... I mean, that's okay,” Jounouchi assures him. 

“I want you to be okay,” Anzu tells him, talking over Jounouchi just a little in casual conversation. Yugi feels it every time she moves, her upper arm and the soft sleeve over it warm against his bare shoulder. She is familiar, and somehow she still comes to see him even when he won't even be going back to school with her in a couple of weeks. He feels awful that it seems like things would almost be more normal and more _promising_ if there were some threat to their lives. 

“Y' heard from Kaiba lately?” Jounouchi asks for some reason, drawing Yugi's focus back to him. Yugi frowns just a little. 

“... No?” he asks. “I don't generally take social calls from him,” he remarks. 

“No, I know,” Jounouchi replies quickly. “Just seems like maybe since he graduated too, and everything, he might be looking to make a buck off a new Duel Disc system or somethin'. Y'know, I was just wondering.” 

 

 

* * *

 

_ Kaiba Corporation Headquarters _

  
  


In another part of Domino City, Seto has been awake for a long time. He has received no calls from anyone in a game shop all day, and he does not plan on placing any calls to Yugi Mutou, either. He has things to do. At least, that is what he kept telling himself. He has risen even earlier since March. In spite of the fact that finishing high school – finally – has given him even more time to attend to his duties as CEO of a multimillion dollar corporation, he still finds his way into his swivel chair before sunrise most mornings. 

Sometimes, he even takes the time to watch it out the expanse of windows from this high up in the city. Not that he'd ever tell anyone. 

“Big brother?” Mokuba asks as he walks into Seto's office. He is dressed in casual clothes and has clearly not been up for very long. His hair is still damp in spite of apparent efforts to dry it, and he rubs at the inner corner of his eye distractedly as if there might still be evidence of sleep in it. 

Seto looks up from his desk and watches his brother for a moment before asking the appropriate, dutiful question. 

“Aren't you supposed to be at school or something?” 

He looks back down to the paperwork on his desk, trying to refocus his eyes and the work of his pen. 

“It's Saturday,” Mokuba replies, watching him with more invested quiet judgment and incredulity. He can feel it, but he doesn't care.

“Shouldn't you _be_ in school on Saturday?” Seto retorts without looking up. 

“Saturday classes are optional,” Mokuba reminds him. 

“You've missed a lot of school,” he says matter-of-factly. 

“Why?” Mokuba asks, and it's a rhetorical question. “Because I got kidnapped a few times?” he asks. “It isn't like I can't catch up, and I don't _feel_ like going to Saturday classes today.” He sits down on a sofa in Seto's office heavily. 

“What _do_ you feel like doing today?” Seto asks. He isn't sure how this conversation has gone on for quite this long. Usually Mokuba is reasonably distant when he is trying to work. But it's Saturday. 

“I don't know,” Mokuba replies. “I haven't gotten to see you very much lately. Not since you stopped coming to school, too.” 

“I... graduated,” Seto reminds him. He looks up and across his office as if he is actually concerned that Mokuba might have forgotten. 

“I know,” Mokuba asks. He meets Seto's gaze, given the opportunity. “Is there something I can help with so we can get out of here faster?” he asks pointedly. 

“Out of here?” Seto replies with a slight lift of his eyebrows. 

“You know, out of the office. On Saturday. It's not like you can't get time off. You're the CEO,” Mokuba reminds him. “And if you're the CEO, and you're busy on Saturday, then you can teach me how to do something so we can finish it and get out of here.” 

“There is a lot of 'we,' in what you just said,” Seto remarks, a little coolly, but he glances around his desk and at his computer screen, considering Mokuba's proposition without saying so right away. 

“Yeah. You're my brother,” Mokuba says in a _'deal-with-it'_ sort of tone that Seto recognizes far too intimately to not know its origin. 

“Fine,” Seto grumbles. “Get the laptop and I'll show you what to do,” he grumbles through gritted teeth, begrudgingly showing Mokuba how to enter the figures on a spreadsheet that, in effect, would get the CEO of Kaiba Corporation to an aquarium or a museum or whatever it was that Mokuba wanted to do on a Saturday. 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I've had writer's block for quite a long time. I've written for a lot of fandoms, too, but I don't think I have written for YuGiOh since sometime in about 2004 when I was still saving it on floppy discs and not posting it anywhere. Recently, I picked up YuGiOh the Abridged Series again from where I left off during the middle of The Cancelled Series. For some reason, it really just awakened something in my soul that was something between nostalgia and serious investment. I'm not really sure what this is, but I have a glimpse of a plan from all the really involved, really serious hopes and headcanons I had from back in the day plus more current feelings about this nonsense. 
> 
> This is based on the Abridged Series as much as it is based on my recollections of the real thing. I chose to use their Japanese names because I cannot take localized names seriously at 27 years of age, and this is a tad more serious than a straight YuGiOh Abridged fic, if only because I cannot reliably be that funny. If you like this fic, please leave a Kudos and, if you can, please leave a comment to let me know. It will let me know that there is interest in... whatever this is. 
> 
> I went ahead and put it in a series folder with high hopes. Both the fic title and the series title drawing from/referencing _It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia_ because I told my friend, earlier, that YGOTAS was great because it was "like YuGiOh was actually _It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia_."


End file.
